Online death threat to prosecutor sends South Florida man to prison

Mark Hillstrom admits that he has spent many hours during the last 13 years leaving long, harassing and threatening voicemails for prosecutors and judges, their secretaries and relatives, and anyone who irks him.

But a threat to kill Broward State Attorney Mike Satz, which the South Florida man posted in a comment on a courthouse blog in November, had better be Hillstrom's last criminal act, a federal judge warned him Thursday.

Sentencing Hillstrom to 10 months in federal prison and three years of probation, U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks told the troubled man that he will go to prison for a much longer term if he breaks the law again. The judge ordered him to stop contacting, threatening or harassing any law enforcement agency, prosecutor or judge.

Hillstrom, 60, who has lived in Broward and Palm Beach counties in recent years, admitted making the death threat in a rambling comment he posted Nov. 27 on the JAABLOG blog, which covers the Broward County Courthouse.

Hillstrom told the judge that his alcoholism, mental illness and access to a phone line or the Internet have gotten him into trouble. He wrote the posting the night before Thanksgiving while "very drunk" and resentful that he could not spend the holiday with his family, he said.

"I have never hurt anybody," Hillstrom told the judge. "I'm a 'phoneaholic' and I'm an alcoholic."

"You are placing these people in fear, which is a form of harm," the judge replied.

Once a successful stockbroker who lived in Fort Lauderdale and served on the board of a group that helps blind people, Hillstrom had an "unfortunate reaction" when his then-wife filed for divorce in 2001, his lawyer Mauricio Lopez Aldazabal said.

Hillstrom began harassing and stalking people and became angry at prosecutors, judges and police officers who handled criminal cases against him — including domestic violence and aggravated stalking allegations — in Broward and Palm Beach counties, records show.

Hillstrom was "relentless," one Broward assistant state attorney wrote to the judge.

For several years, Hillstrom called the prosecutor's office many times a day during office hours and at night, filling his voicemail with long, harassing messages mostly between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m., the prosecutor wrote.

Hillstrom also left voicemail messages for the man's secretary and the prosecutor's father-in-law, a defense attorney, as well as sending distasteful emails when the prosecutor was unwell.

A court psychologist who diagnosed Hillstrom with bipolar disorder, alcohol dependency and an antisocial disorder had to obtain a restraining order against Hillstrom when he began harassing him and showed up at the man's home, court records show.